EKOLogy Vision Statement:

We believe that learning in the outdoors develops confident, intellectually curious, empathetic and creative children.

Through outdoor learning experiences, children will develop a sense of wonder and gratitude in the beauty, diversity, and complexity of the world...

and will become environmentally and socially responsible people with a passion for lifelong learning.

Learning through outdoor experience integrates BC Curriculum with the innate wonderings and curiosity of the students..

EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING

• teachers facilitate emergent, experiential, inquiry-based, play-based, and place-based learning

PLACE-BASED LEARNING

• builds a deep and on-going relationship to place.
• children form intimate relationships with place through regular visits to the same outdoor environment

RISK

• Teachers help children identify and navigate risk.
• Opportunities to experience risk is an integral part of learning and healthy development.

FIRST PEOPLES PRINCIPLES OF LEARNING

• Recognize role of Indigenous knowledge
• Involves patience and time
• Learning embedded in memory, history and story

CORE COMPETENCIES

• Learning in the Outdoors fosters children's:
• creative and critical thinking
• effective communication,
• personal, social and environmental awareness

Outdoors:
Why
How
When
What
Where

WHY OUTDOORS

RESEARCH

• Improved confidence, social skills, communication, motivation, and concentration
• Improved physical stamina, fine and gross motor skills

RESEARCH

• Positive identity for individuals and communities
• Improved environmentally sustainable behaviours and ecological literacy

RESEARCH

• Healthy and safe risk-taking
• Improved creativity and resilience
• Improved self-regulation

RESEARCH

• Reduced stress and increased patience, self-discipline, capacity for attention, and recovery from mental fatigue
• Improved higher level cognitive skills

RESEARCH

• Increased knowledge of environment
• Increased frequency of visiting nature with families

HOW OUTDOORS

ROUTINES

• Children are responsible for their own clothing: putting it on and hanging it up to dry

SAFETY ROUTINES

• We have established safety guidelines for students.
• Clear boundaries
• Whistle
• Behaviour

AGREEMENT FOR SAFETY

• Children adhere to rules when they discuss and set them together and understand reasons why they should follow them

WHEN OUTDOORS

SCHEDULED OUTDOOR TIME

• Whole school times
• K's one hour in the morning plus extra nature walk times
• Grade 1-4 between recess and lunch and extra time in afternoons

WHAT OUTDOORS

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• Interdisciplinary learning
• Authentic contexts
• Student agency

Interdisciplinary

“The real world does not compartmentalise maths and reading, for example, so it makes little sense to organize a child’s learning in this way."

Authentic learning contexts

• Inquiry-based, emergent curriculum
• Experiential learning
• Relevant to children's lives

Agency

• Student choice
• Engagement
• Motivation
• Life-long learners

WHERE OUTDOORS

School and Local Areas

• Pergola outdoor classroom to be built Wetland reclamation in back corner Pumpkin Patch Semiahmoo Fish and Game
• A Rocha
• Garden
• Redwood Park

Current School Ground 

Proposed wetland 

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Questions

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